Confident Sober Women

Celebrating Imperfectly: Why Perfectionism Almost Stopped Episode 200 | The Truth About Milestone Paralysis in Recovery

• Shelby

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In this raw and honest 200th episode milestone, host Shelby John opens up about how perfectionism nearly prevented her from celebrating this incredible achievement. Through vulnerable sharing, she explores how the pressure to create the "perfect" celebration led to temporary paralysis - a common challenge many face in recovery and life transitions.


Key Takeaways

  • How perfectionism can paradoxically prevent us from taking action
  • Why non-traditional celebrations can be more authentic and meaningful
  • The power of vulnerability in leadership and recovery
  • Navigating life transitions: empty nesting, perimenopause, and evolving relationships
  • The importance of community in long-term recovery success


Episode Highlights

[00:00] - Shelby reveals why there was a brief podcast hiatus [02:15] - The paralysis of perfectionism: when expectations prevent progress [04:30] - Reframing celebrations: why traditional timelines don't matter [07:45] - Reflection on recent mini-episodes and community feedback [10:30] - Vision casting for 2025: personal and professional transitions [13:45] - Introduction to remote neurofeedback opportunities [15:30] - Call for guest suggestions and community involvement


Featured in This Episode

  • Discussion of end-of-year mini-episodes
  • Preview of upcoming guest interviews
  • Introduction to remote neurofeedback program
  • Vision boarding and future self-work
  • Community celebration plans for Episode 200


Resources Mentioned


Connect With Shelby


Episode Tags

#SoberPodcast #Recovery #Perfectionism #MilestoneCelebration #EmotionalSobriety #WomenInRecovery #SoberLife #PersonalGrowth #Authenticity #ConfidentSoberWomen


About the Show

The Confident Sober Women podcast helps women thrive in long-term recovery by building lives they don't want to escape from. Host Shelby John combines her expertise as a therapist, recovery coach, and woman with 22 years of sobriety to provide practical strategies and authentic insights for sustainable r

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Oh, and by the way, if you didn’t know, my remote Neurofeedback Therapy program is up and running. Learn more here!

If you aren't part of the Confident Sober Women Facebook group, it's a great place to be. There are over a thousand other sober women there building lives they don't want to escape from. Come on over and join us.

And if you haven't read my memoir, grab a copy today and maybe a second one for a friend. There is so much hope in recovery, and I shared my story so raw and vulnerable so that others would know they aren't alone and that there is a way to live well, manage relationships, parent your kids, and have a healthy body, all while staying sober. Grab a copy of Recovering in Recovery: The Life-Changing Joy of Sobriety wherever books are sold.

  Well, hey there, sober ladies. Thank you so much for joining me today for the Confident Sober Women podcast. I am so glad that you guys are here. And I have been remiss in getting a weekly episode out for the last couple weeks, and I have a confession to make. It is because this episode, literally this one, is our 200th episode. 

Which I am Overjoyed about. I can't really believe it. I'm in shock, but what I was doing was complicating the entire situation because of things that I've learned and heard in the marketing world and over the last several years kind of learning how to build a business online and I was letting those things Create stories in my head about how this situation should happen.

Overtake actually doing the work. So, people talk about, you know, celebrating these milestones, making it a really big deal, creating.  Giveaways and challenges and, you know, all kinds of different things, adding special guests. And when I had my last celebration, I can't remember if it was 100 episodes or 150, I did do that.

I had some really amazing guests from past episodes who were very influential kind of come on and give us updates and it was really, really fun and I loved it. But this milestone is hitting right after the holidays. I just came off of a really extensive kind of four week time with holidays and my kids home from college and then trying to regroup in my practice.

I got super slammed in my private practice before the holidays with  new Consult calls and new clients, and I have a waiting list, so there's just been a lot going on, and instead of just accepting the fact that maybe I wasn't gonna be able to plan, quote unquote, this big, you know, celebration for the 200th episode, and, you know, make it this big special thing that I could market and talk about, I just didn't do it.

And I'm kicking myself now because I feel like that was Just really silly. And I wanted to get here, come on here and be honest with you guys because I would imagine that there's times in your life when this has happened for you, right? Where you have had something going on and maybe you just become frozen.

You know, maybe the stories that you're telling yourself about how this thing quote unquote should be or how it's supposed to go  is preventing you from doing anything at all. This is not the first time this has happened to me. It's just the first time it's happened Kind of with this podcast or in my work in this way because I love doing this podcast.

It's literally the most favorite thing that I do. I love my community. I love working with sober women and connecting and having these conversations.  So this particular situation was a little bit unusual for me and I, I'm a little bit disappointed in how I was handling it. And so today I decided, you know, I'm just going to get on here and I'm going to show up and I'm going to share this with you.

I'm going to get really honest and granular and tell you what happened. And what happened was I was making something a bigger deal than it needed to be And then it prevented me from  doing anything at all. So I got frozen. And I'm not saying that a 200 episode milestone isn't a big deal. It is a super, super big deal.

And I think that's what was happening. I knew it was a big deal. I know all of our milestones. Whether it's, you know, being sober for one day, or two years, or twenty years. Or, you know, having a wedding anniversary, or celebrating milestones with your children. All of these things are big deals. There's tons of them.

But it doesn't mean that they have to have a certain celebration around them. Or that they have to unfold in a specific way. So, anyway, that's what's happening. So that's why you haven't heard from me in a couple weeks. I've literally been kind of Trying to figure out how to handle this. I wanted it to be special.

And so I had a little bit of an aha moment and I decided, you know, why can't I make the 200th episode celebration a little bit non traditional? Like, why can't we have the 200th episode celebration? You know, in three or four weeks, when I can plan it. So maybe it'll be the 204th episode, but we can still celebrate the 200th episode, right?

Like, we've created 200 episodes of the Confident Sober Women podcast together, and that is amazing, and phenomenal, and should be celebrated. So, I decided I was gonna let go of these stories, and begin to rewrite a different story around this particular situation, and create the opportunity for me to  Build a celebration around our show and Present it at a non traditional time.

So that's what's gonna happen. I'm not exactly sure what that's gonna look like I'd love to hear your ideas if you have any Fun suggestions, you can email me at holisticlivingatshelbyjohn. com. You can also reach that on my, through my website, shelbyjohn. com. You can DM me on all the socials.  And share with me what you think we should do.

You know, how should we celebrate 200 episodes of the Confidence Over Women podcast? I'd love to hear it. I hope you guys are doing really well with this new year. I also can't believe that we are  at the end of January. You know, we're now I guess four weeks into or almost into the new year. To me, that always feels like, it feels like Christmas was like six months ago, but it was really only, you know, a month ago.

I'm sure you guys have, I've been very busy with work and family and school and all the things. And I'm curious how things are going for you. Did you enjoy the mini episodes that we produced at the end of the year? There was a bunch of mini episodes that I put out rather quickly. Again, that was like an idea I had.

I probably should have had that in like September so I could have planned more for that. But the women that showed up for me were incredible. They were willing to come on very, very last minute and share with us some of their Best ideas around the topics that we were talking about at the end of the year.

So if you didn't listen to those, they're still valuable because oftentimes I feel like at this point in the quote unquote new year We might just be kind of coming up to the surface for air and like now we're ready to step into Kind of what we want to do for this new year I think around the holiday time and if you're like me with a busy family, maybe kids or family are in town It's hard to think about You know, what do we want this next year to look like?

Or, it's hard to create like that vision board for our future self. But, it's never too late to do that. So, I'd encourage you to jump back into those mini episodes. They were, they were short and sweet and to the point. And I think really helpful. I really liked that idea. So, I think I am going to continue with that.

If you guys liked it, let me know. I'd love to get your feedback because I thought it was a good idea for the end of the year. When, when I'm not producing kind of those regular weekly shows. They're shorter, a little bit more digestible, and around topics specifically related to things that typically we are  going through or feeling towards the end of the year.

So let me know what you think about that. I've already recorded a bunch of episodes for this upcoming year. I'm talking to new guests. I'm really getting exposed to all kinds of new women that are in the alcohol and substance free community, which I love because it just makes me realize that there are so many of us.

There are so many. Whenever I see new women emerging on different platforms or you know, on social media and things, I just, I just get so joyful. I feel like my heart just kind of smiles up like, here's another one, here's somebody I didn't even know existed that was In our community. And so I'm just going to continue to explore that to continue to reach out to people.

Also, if you have any guest ideas or you know people that are have been sober for a while and are doing really amazing things with their lives and are could talk about topics that we talk about here around emotional sobriety and building confidence. Let me know, send me their names, send me their contact information and we can have a chat about it because This community is just astounding to me.

We're all  such miracles and I just love when I continue to meet new people and discover new women that I didn't know before and that I didn't know were alcohol free or sober.  So let me know if you have any insight into that. I'm enjoying that and I really look forward to where we're going to go this year.

You know, this vision for 2025 I think is really  Powerful and different, you know, for me, I'm stepping into some kind of big new spaces. I turned 50 this year My last child is a junior in high school So he still has one more year, but he's no really transitioning out. So we will be quote unquote true empty nesters Relatively soon, although it feels like we're already very much on the edge of that with his independence He drives now and he works and goes to school and plays lacrosse.

So like, you know, he's very busy  So, you know, kind of stepping into this next stage, and also, you know, perimenopausal stuff. So if you're a woman of my age and stage, perhaps you're kind of experiencing some of these perimenopausal hormonal changes transitioning maybe in your relationship, if you have a long term partner, or if you're dating again, or whatever that looks like for you, transitioning into this new space of having more time than usual, or having different kind of time.

What does that look like? How am I going to fill it? Do we  We focus on more friendships. We pick up a new hobby. How does that look like for my work? So all of those kind of visions that I laid out in my vision board for this year are, are really going to start to unfold. So I really look forward to unpacking a lot of that with you guys.

And I'd like to hear more from you about what yours are so that we can talk about other people's, not just mine. Maybe we could do some live episodes with, with you guys. If anybody's interested in that, let me know. If you want to jump on like a Call with me or doesn't have to be live. It can be recorded where we literally talk about your vision And maybe do a little coaching even like around what that looks like and how to kind of put on that future self Maybe that would be a super fun thing to do in the coming months With the people that are in this community.

So if that's interest you let me know  and as usual just really highlighting the things that make us thrive in long term recovery. And that's my main focus here, is to really build a community full of women who are doing sober things and building lives they don't want to escape from. One way I'm doing that in my private practice, as you probably know, is through remote neurofeedback.

So that program is accessible to everyone in the whole world because it's not under licensure. So I do have a remote neurofeedback program that I'm offering in my practice right now. If you'd like to learn more of that, you can schedule a quick 15 minute consult call with me and I can go over that with you.

It's pretty astounding. It's really, really powerful for ADHD, insomnia, anxiety, depression, and a lot of performance issues. Things like, you know, work performance or sports performance, things like that. So, if that interests you, I'd love to have a chat with you about what that looks like and how I can help you with it.

So, Remote Neurofeedback is another neurologically based form of treatment that's pretty powerful and it's super accessible because you do it at your own home three to four times a week using an app and kind of basically while you're watching Netflix or listening to a podcast. On your couch. So it's pretty cool. 

Okay, so that's all for me today. Make sure you tune in Make sure you're subscribed to the show So you never miss an episode if you have friends in your life who are kind of living this lifestyle And it would be interested in learning more about thriving and long term recovery Make sure you show you share the confidence over women podcast with them so that they can also Subscribe to the show and follow along and enjoy everything that you are enjoying.

Please make sure you reach out at holistic living, W H O L I S T I C living, L I V I N G at shelbyjohn. com or through any of the socials in DM. I look forward to hearing from you guys about our 200th episode celebration, non traditionally, and what ideas you might have about how we can unpack that celebration together, and if you're interested in possibly doing  kind of live coaching on stuff around future self, and if you have any awesome guests who are doing amazing things in recovery, and would be a good guest for our show. 

So have a fantastic day, and I'll see you next time.